Thursday 20th Santorini

So we’ve reached the furthest eastern point of our cruise – the world famous Cycladic island of Santorini.

We were told that we would be arriving at 7:30 & that it would be worth the views to get up out on the front deck & they would provide a commentary.  So we did this, however we were approaching from the east, so the cliffs were all in shadow & we couldn’t see much.  However we were struck by the size of the harbour created by the volcano caldera.  It is way bigger than I had thought it would be!

I’d always been interested in Santorini (or Thera as it was formerly known) since hearing about it in 1^st year Uni when we were doing ancient civilisations.  The experts believe that it was the explosion of Thera at about 1700 BC that destroyed the Minoan civilisation on Crete 130 Kms away.  I’ve always wondered at the power of an event that could do that!

And then as well as the historic events that created the island as it is today, there are those marvellous photos of Santorini all over the place & I have seen photos from friends and family. 

So our expectations were quite high – but they were well & truly met.  

We’d talked to a lovely Belgian couple who had holidayed on Santorini last year.  They told us that there was little value in a tour & that self arranged travel worked just as well.  And they were right. 

Santorini does not have a dock so we had to anchor in the caldera and be transported to shore on small boats.  We were on the 1^st boat to get off the ship so arrived in time to get onto the cable car to the top without any delay.  We thought that we’d go directly to Oia (said Ee – ah) which is where all of the best Santorini photos are taken.  We shared a cab & for Eu20 we found ourselves in Oia really quickly. 

The trip showed us that while the caldera side of the island is precipitous, on the “outside” of the island there is quite a lot of gently sloping land which is farmed.  However the island gets almost no rain, so growing anything is very difficult. 

We did the obligatory visit to a few shops in Oia, bought some gifts and an interesting photo on canvas & took numerous photos while soaking in the views.  (There are hundreds of shops catering for tourists just in this village.)

We decided to take the local bus back to Fira – at Eu 1.40, standing up all the way.  It was great to do, but I’d say that 95% of those on the bus are tourists. 

This is the 1^st time on this trip where we have seen tourism numbers overwhelming the capacity of the infrastructure.  Some roads are barely wide enough for 2 cars, yet they have hundreds of tourist coaches on them – in both directions.  At one stage we had to almost back into someone’s front yard to let 8 tourist coaches pass us before we could proceed. 

We got back to Fira and walked the streets just to soak up the feel of the place.  We then bought a wonderful small seafood tasting platter & a few local beers & sat at the edge of the cliffs looking into the caldera which had 4 cruise ships in it.

People had talked about the amazing vines on Santorini that grow close to the ground with the grapes almost on the ground.  They do this because the place is so windy & also they vines get dew on them which assists in then channelling the dew to water the vines.  There were comments about this process creating unique and high quality wine.  So we had to have a taste.  So we sat in another café high on the cliffs, with a magnificent view & ordered a glass of red & white.  Well – it may be unique but is sure isn’t good.  I ended up saying to Rhonda that if you thought of it as a fruit cup cordial rather than wine then it was almost drinkable – but as wine?  No way.

While walking around Fira we came across the line for the cable car to get down to the ships.  It looked about 500m long.  Each cable car cluster is 5 cars that can hold 6 people – so each shuttle takes 30 people.  We had never planned to take it down, as we wanted to walk the 588 steps down.  The steps are also used by donkeys which go up & down the steps very quickly.  The steps have considerable amounts of donkey poo on them in places, but you can navigate around it.  (The tour guides on the ship had made it out that it was horrendous, but it was fine).   Each step is over a metre wide and sloping, with the riser for the step being only about 10 cms.  However the stones that you walk on are very highly polished from all the traffic & Rhonda had shoes that didn’t grip but slide.  So it was a fairly slow and cautious walk down. The photo below doesn't do justice to the steepness.

We left at 6pm & by then the sun was shining on the cliffs of Santorini.  The cliffs have layers of coloured layers of rock – many of them related to the volcanic eruption.  These layers, coupled with the white houses like icing on the top of the island made a sensational view as we pulled away & set sail for Turkey.  We stood up on the 10 deck and watched the islands retreat - all up it was a fantastic day.

Leaving Santorini - Fira on the cliff top

Below are a few photos of Santorini.